C.B. McHaul, the Truck Driving Action Figure (1977)

Disco was not the only inexplicable fad of the late ‘70s. For some reason, Americans became briefly obsessed with truck drivers and truck driving “culture.” Station wagons were outfitted with C.B radios, the Smokey and the Bandit movies were the second-most popular franchise behind Star Wars, and a mostly-spoken song about truck drivers that talked over C.B radios was a #1 hit – “Convoy” by C.W. McCall. This was pretty much an adults-only fad (because duh, Star Wars), so any toy tied in with the fad was doomed to failure. Like this one: Mego Toys’ eight-figure line of truck driver action figures called C.B. McHaul, an obvious ripoff of C.W. McCall. Here’s an ad for the dolls, in which the hired kid actors are clearly faking their enthusiasm.

From the middle of nowhere in the Pacific Northwest, I contribute to the Retroist, write for trivia publications, and blog about music in a humorous fashion. I feel about "Back to the Future" the way you feel about "Star Wars." Also, I'm married and have a child (sorry ladies, orphans).

Related

Subscribe to the Retroist Newsletter

Post navigation

4 thoughts on “C.B. McHaul, the Truck Driving Action Figure (1977)”

metagirlsays:

One of the parents of a kid I carpooled with in grade school had a CB in his El Dorado. I never got to use it, or even witness it in use, but I liked to admire it from the backseat. My own folks were never that cool. We didn’t even get cable until the ’90s.

i us to live in san diego and had a 1200 watt liner runing with a cobra 2000 base station the mexicans hated me at the time the mexican police only hade cbs to talk to each other with and thay had to most of the time bagg me not to step on them and i whold stand by only if thay whould tell me in englesh what happend after there 1199 were over yours truly “gm”

The truck toy is contemporary and nicely detailed for its time but that police cruiser looks like it’s from the late 1930’s.
Possibly a reuse by MEGO from a prior toy line?
Like MetaGirl, I too had a friend whose parents had CBs in their cars and a base station in their house. We kids were strictly not allowed to touch them. Nor did I ever witness them in use by my friend’s parents.
There was always some veiled threat of being arrested if we fooled around with the CBs.
But of course we did whenever his parents were out (back in the day kids under 10 but over 6 were frequently left unsupervised for short periods of time while parents went to the store, post office, but cigarettes, etc).
We never got arrested but annoyed quite a few other CB users with constant requests for responses to our “radio check”.